1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to radiographic devices. More particularly, the present invention relates to portable X-ray generation.
2. Background of the Invention
X-ray photography has provided great benefits in the years since its introduction. X-rays are now used routinely in security settings to scan packages, luggage, and travelers for contraband. Perhaps the most visible benefit has been in the medical and veterinary fields, where x-rays are used widely, from radiation therapy to diagnostic imaging. In veterinary medicine specifically, x-rays are used to generate diagnostic images of soft tissue(s) and bone(s).
In the past, x-ray generator photography devices were bulky, unwieldy, and utilized film-cassette-chemical processor combinations to capture image data to x-ray film. In this analog style, x-ray generators emit x-rays to expose x-ray film. Exposed film is removed from the cassette housing and subjected to a chemical process, to create an x-ray image on physical film for viewing on a back-lit, light box.
Not unlike digital cameras, digital x-ray detectors have been utilized in combination with x-ray generators, to record x-ray exposure data instantly, outputting this data into a computer readable electronic format. Film-cassette-chemical processor combinations are being replaced by the digital versions.
However, such digital versions are not without their limitations. Taking up a great deal of space and weighing several hundred pounds or more, present digital x-ray devices and/or “rooms”, primarily designed to be installed in a radiology suite, or for in-hospital use in fixed locations, cannot be easily moved once installed. Advances in technology have shrunk the size and weight of X-ray generators and associated digital x-ray components, to the point where “mobile” or “portable” x-ray devices on wheels or in multiple component configurations are now possible.
Yet again, even “mobile” or “portable” x-ray devices do not presently live up to the requirements of users who operate outside of a hospital environment. For example, major medical device manufacturers have developed “mobile” or “portable” hospital use digital x-ray consoles which provide for x-ray generation, digital detector capture, and computer storage/display, for use primarily at patient bedside, rather than in the radiology room suite. However, these devices still weigh, in total, approximately two hundred pounds. Two hundred pounds does not fit any reasonable definition of “portable” or “mobile” for users requiring use in the field, out of a mobile veterinary truck, in a horse's stall, in a zoo pen, or alongside a holding pen for marine mammals. Such “portable” or “mobile” devices, though more self-contained than conventional radiology suite devices, still suffer from the difficulties of portability.
Other portable x-ray generator devices, combined with the multiple separate components of a digital detector system, computer, monitor, and synchronization box, do weigh less, in total. These multi-component digital x-ray systems are used primarily in veterinary medicine for portable fieldwork in equine and zoo patients. In these multi-component solutions, several separate components work together: a portable, handheld x-ray generator; a digital x-ray detector and cable; a computer display and text input unit; and an associated “synchronization” box to coordinate the timing and functions of the individual devices. The disparate devices are coordinated using cables and are powered using several power supplies, connections, and adapters.
The conventional portable, handheld x-ray generator has a “clicker”, a two-stage button. In the first stage, pressed halfway down, the clicker powers up the generator and prepares to “fire” x-ray photons. When the stand-alone x-ray generator is cabled within a team of digital acquisition devices, and the first stage of the “clicker” is activated, the first stage clicker signal is sent to a synchronization unit, which in turn communicates with a digital detector attached to the synchronization unit or attached computer. In this communication, the digital detector is communicated via the clicker-synchronization-computer chain to be in an “open” state for reception of x-rays. In the second stage, pressed fully down, the clicker commands the stand-alone generator to transmit X-rays for detection by the detector. The separate synchronization unit coordinates and synchronizes communication of timing and of data between the devices. In addition, the separate synchronization unit attached computer display has a display and keyboard (or other input device, such as a mouse, a keyboard or a touchscreen) to allow the display, process, and editing of image and patient data. These separate devices do weigh less than their “portable” or “mobile” human hospital optimized counterparts. However, they require the user to handle three to four separate components while going to and from the x-ray patient and the input and display device as the user alternates between detector positioning/exposure and image acceptance/labeling, and other functions. This problem may be especially acute in the veterinary field, where the patient, a large animal such as a horse, is out in the pasture or stable and cannot be led into an office. Further, field based exams often are performed on large, dangerous animals. By streamlining exam time and cable management, developing a new design can result in superior results, increased patient compliance, safer operation, lower costs, and superior field durability.
What is needed, therefore, is a new, integrated, portable, handheld device combining all of the features of the synchronization, display, computer processing and recording, data input, and actual x-ray generator exposure into one lightweight, portable, handheld device. In this way, users may label, expose, review, enhance, accept, and label subsequent images in a study series “patient-side,” without need to interface with a stand-alone display and input computer device and synchronization unit. Further, a number of cables and power-plug-ins are eliminated, providing a more stable, smaller, safer, transportable, serviceable, and durable solution.